Polyps of the colon are very common. There are two major types of colonic polyps, neoplastic and non-neoplastic. Non-neoplastic polyps are entirely benign with no malignant potential and do not necessarily need to be resected. Hyperplastic polyps, juvenile polyps, mucosal prolapse and normal mucosal polyps are examples of non-neoplastic polyps. Conversely, neoplastic polyps are pre-malignant, a condition requiring resection and further surveillance. Examples of premalignant neoplastic polyps are tubular adenoma, villous adenoma and tubulovillous adenoma.
Conventional laser-induced fluorescence emission and reflectance spectroscopy can distinguish between neoplastic and non-neoplastic tissue with accuracies approaching about 85%. However, typically these methods require that the full spectrum be measured with algorithms dependent on many emission wavelengths.